


You Said It's Warm in Charlotte; It's Not.

by incendiary1 (trycatpennies)



Category: Glee RPF, Starkid RPF
Genre: M/M, Touring
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-28
Updated: 2012-04-28
Packaged: 2017-11-04 11:39:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,116
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/393422
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/trycatpennies/pseuds/incendiary1
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Joey gets a taste of being a rockstar, a taste of being lonely on tour.</p>
            </blockquote>





	You Said It's Warm in Charlotte; It's Not.

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Siobhan_Schuyler](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Siobhan_Schuyler/gifts).



> I tried to keep my timelines as accurate as possible, but I don't actually know what nights they Starkids spent in hotels, or on the bus or whatever. But hopefully I'm either close, or you forgive me. And this fic is for my wife, who was complaining that there isn't any tourfic in Starkid or Glee fandom. Bandom ruined us forever.

**Austin**

Somewhere around Austin, Joey starts to lose track of time. It’s not a long tour but it’s just fast enough and just new enough that it trips him up.

_What time is it there_

He sends the text without thinking; Darren’s name is the top of his recent messages (where it mostly stays) and he gets a reply back within seconds. 

_2:43_

Joey smiles and looks around, briefly. No one else is around. Meredith had tried to convince him to come for dinner, but he’s pretty sure he’s fighting with Lauren, and he’s just overall feeling people’d out. He opens up the sandwich he’d chanced from the corner store and plunks himself down on the curb in front of the bus, taking a bite before he answers.

_It’s nearly 5 here_

He takes another bite and watches a big gust of wind kick up some dust across the street, and tries to ignore the hole that’s starting somewhere between his gut and his heart.

_Come soon_ , he texts, without waiting for Darren’s answer. 

+

**Atlanta**

There’s something totally different about performing like this. As lame as it is, he feels like a fucking rockstar. It’s not like acting, not like performing musicals or even doing songs at events or whatever. These people are coming to see them, to watch them sing and perform and personify, and it’s a trip he wouldn’t trade for anything in the world. 

The lights fade out and he can hear feedback in his in-ears so he yanks them out, only to be swarmed by at least three of the other guys, hugging him tightly. He grins, hugging back, feeling high on this, on life, on screams and people singing along, and on doing what he loves.

+

**Charlotte**

“I’m drunk,” he says, and Darren laughs on the other end of the phone. The show was fantastic, and he’s at least two pitchers (shared with Joe) and three shots (shared with no one) into his cups. It’s cool out but Joey can’t feel it, and he knows he wore a jacket into the bar but it’s gone now. He’s weaving his way back to the bus, one hand pressed against his forehead, the other keeping his phone next to his ear.

“Sounds like it was a good show,” Darren says, his voice warm. Joey wants to think Darren sounds sad, but he could be imagining it. Sometimes he wants to hope, selfishly, that Darren’s missing them. (Him.) But Darren’s doing what he loves, just as much as Joey is.

“How many more days,” Joey says, and he stops outside the bus, dropping his voice a little. He knows that not everyone went out, so chances are someone’s asleep on the bus already. “How many days till you come out?”

“How drunk are you, Joseph Richter?” Darren says, and there it is, unmistakable, the fondness and a little bit of sadness. And Joey aches for it. For his best friend under his arm and Darrens’ voice in his ear for real, instead of a distant imitation over an iPhone. 

“Too drunk,” Joey admits, and he rubs his hand over his face. He’s horny, he’s reckless, and he misses Darren. He wants to do something stupid. “I should go to bed.”

“Probably,” Darren says, and his voice is softer, like he can hear Joey’s mood come down, shift. “It’s late.”

“Yeah,” Joey says, and he punches in the bus code, nearly tripping up the steps. Darren waits, and Joey makes it to his bunk, tossing off his shoes before climbing in. “Ok, m’here.”

“Seven days,” Darren says, finally, and Joey grins. “I’ll be there in a week.”

+

**Cincinnati**

Joey’s full, and he’s still picking at the mashed potatoes and gravy on his plate because it’s been like, a month since he’s eaten this well and he’s wondering if there’s any way he can overeat and store it for the next couple of days until he gets home.

New York is a looming presence; bigger than he knows how to handle. New York is their mecca, a once in a lifetime (twice, two nights, truly a miracle) chance to do this. 

And Darren will be there. 

He hasn’t texted Darren in two days, since they left Maryland, cutting across three states for a taste of family and home cooking, and he’s what’s missing. Joey’s getting sick of missing him, to be honest, and sicker of hiding it. He’d followed Darren across the country, and now he’s two thousand miles from home and Darren’s still there. 

But he doesn’t take his phone out. He wonders, instead, exactly when he stopped being able to manage. Darren had fled Michigan before him, leaving for LA while Joey drove back and forth from cold Ann Arbour for class to colder Chicago for Starship rehearsals. One incredibly cold winter, trying to keep his car going while he studied technical theatre textbooks on Chicago studio floors and slept on Lauren’s pull out couch, and mastered puppeteering. It hadn’t seemed like they were apart then, not so viscerally. Now more than ever it seems like Darren’s separate from this, distinct. And he can feel himself drifting the same way. Closer to one than the other, and he wonders when Darren became more home than Starkid.

+

**Boston**

_I’m in the lobby, come get me!!!!! the venue won’t let me in._

Joey tucks his phone back in his pocket and hesitates, just a momentary lapse of confidence. (He wonders, sometimes, how he’s lucky enough to have Darren in his life. The more famous Darren gets the luckier Joey feels. It’s both thrilling and terrifying). He glances at Lauren, who shoots him a ‘get the fuck out there’ look and he grins back at her, hopping off the stage. They’re in the middle of soundcheck, but they're basically waiting for Charlene and Carlos to tune up, so no one will miss him. He pushes the doors to the lobby open and gets side-checked by Darren, who wraps both arms around Joey’s waist and buries his head in Joey’s chest. 

“I fucking missed you,” Darren mumbles, and Joey drops his head, buries his face in Darren’s hair and takes a minute, just a fucking minute. He doesn’t care who sees this, intimate as it is, because it’s worth it. There aren’t any fans inside the theatre yet, though Joey’s sure Darren had gotten held up just outside.

“Asshole,” Joey mutters, and he feels Darren laugh before he pulls back. “I missed you too.”

-

The show is spectacular; Darren slots in without missing a beat, tucked under Joey’s arm, or pushing at Lauren and Jaime. Teasing and laughing and being Darren the strange obnoxious theatre kid, the guy who Joey sometimes watches get lost under the Darren who gets followed by TMZ, or sings for Alan Menken. It’s refreshing.

They manage to make it out to say hi to fans after the show. At some point Joey’s phone buzzes, and he looks at Darren, five feet away, who has his phone out but is carefully avoiding Joey’s look.

The text makes Joey blush. He tucks his phone back into his pocket and goes back to chatting and signing, glancing at Darren as often as he thinks he can get away with it.

+

**Somewhere between Boston and New York**

“A hotel would have been nice,” Darren says, mouthing across Joey’s collarbone. Joey shrugs and slides his fingers up the side of Darren’s chest, relearning the shape of him. Darren’s head is brushing the ceiling of the bunk and Joey’s on his back, both knees spread with Darren between them; it’s the only way they’re going to fit in the tiny space.

“We drive into New York and check in at like, five am, then sleep till sound check,” Joey says. Darren’s warm against him; the press of his skin against Joey’s feels like both pressure and release. They can’t do anything, not really, not when they’re separated from the rest of the tour by a curtain and flimsy bunk walls. But the touch is there, and Joey revels in it. 

“Or we don't sleep,” Darren says, and Joey laughs, soft, as Darren gently ruts against him. They’re wearing boxers, both of them, but nothing else, and crammed into Joey’s bunk they’re basically immobile, the minutest movements bringing them into contact over and over. 

“Or we don't sleep,” Joey repeats, and he squeezes Darren’s hips, nosing at his temple. “Come kiss me.” 

They kiss slow. They’ve been like this for about an hour, and the urgency of meeting back up is gone. Joey licks at Darren’s lower lip, already swollen from where Joey’d left his mark earlier. He lets Darren sink into it, into this, the two of them fitting like they always have (will), and he opens his mouth when Darren shifts up a little higher to take control.

“Fuck busses,” Darren says, and he ruts again at Joey’s hip, making Joey breathe out, rough. They’re both half hard, and he considers--

“This is not a fuck bus,” comes Lauren’s voice from somewhere above them, and Darren glares at the ceiling. “Keep it in your pants, assholes.”

Darren looks back down at him and Joey smirks, shifting into a grin when Darren mouths _I missed her, too._

+

**New York, First**

“You do realize that the two of you live together and are going home together in like, 36 hours right?” Lauren says when Joey misses his third cue because he’s staring at Darren. “Or did he really wear you out that much at the hotel this morning?”

“ Look, just because you didn’t get laid,” Joey says, and he turns to her putting both hands on her shoulders, before looking down at his shirt. “Fuck, this sweater is dirty.”

“Ugh, boys. Maybe if you stopped sucking each other’s dicks for ten seconds you’d have had time to dress properly,” she says, but it’s nearly fond and she stomps off, yelling something at Darren about his boyfriend being a slob and a nymphomaniac rolled into one stupidly tall package. Darren yells something back about proportions and three other people groan and Joey blushes and Darren grins at him and everything is fucking perfect.

+

**New York, Second**

“I can’t believe you’re only going to be home for two weeks,” Joey says, and he kisses across Darren’s shoulder, pinning him to the bed with his body, two fingers working at stretching Darren’s ass open. Darren drops his head onto the mattress, shifting back into Joey, silently begging. Joey bites at the back of his neck. “Turn over.”

He moves back so Darren can turn, kissing him halfway there, as he’s sitting up. Darren shifts against him and Joey pulls back, reluctant, waiting until Darren’s settled on his back, legs spread so Joey ends up kneeling between them. Darren props himself up on his elbows, face serious.

“I’m not mad,” Joey says, before Darren can apologize, or defend himself, or whatever Darren’s about to do. Joey’s just stating the obvious; he’s not looking for anything else. “I just miss you.”

He lets Darren tug him down into a kiss, and if they’re both a little more desperate than they were a minute ago, neither of them will mention it. It’s what they signed up for, when they started this.

“Fuck me,” Darren says, and Joey nods, biting at Darren’s jaw and then reaching between them, palming Darren’s cock just to make him arch up. Darren’s loud in this, just like he’s loud in everything, and Joey sucks a mark into Darren’s skin, just under his ear, a stamp.

It’s urgent without being rough. They fuck slow, hot and desperate and Darren comes first, letting Joey fuck into him through it, and Joey loves the way Darren shivers with each drag of his dick, the way the sweat beads on Darren’s forehead, his body hot and tight around Joey. Darren kisses him when he comes, quietly, overwhelmed.

“You’re always home, you know," Darren says, later. They’re curled up, and Joey’s setting an alarm. They have to be at the venue for three, and Joey figures if he gives them enough time so he can blow Darren in the shower. When Joey shoots Darren a confused look, Darren tugs him back into bed. “I mean, wherever you are. That’s home to me."

“Good thing you can’t get rid of me, then,” Joey says, and he rolls back over, kissing Darren. “I’ll come visit you when you’re here next month for rehearsals. Since you came. I mean, I know you came to tour--”

“No,” Darren interrupts him, and Joey stops, partly because Darren’s interrupted him, partly because Darren’s kissing his jaw, gentle. “I came for you.”


End file.
